Hamartias, Memories and SelfLoathing
by ohsosexyfoxhat
Summary: Draco Malfoy looks back on his life three months after the end of the 2nd Wizarding War. One-shot, enjoy!


The mist moved towards me; it got closer and closer, until a skull emerged, with a rolling tongue. No – not a tongue; it's a snake. From the lips of the skull appears Voldemort, hiding behind the skull's front teeth. He turns his head, his white face, a mask on top of his blood red nose a slit, like a snake, his trademark.

"Draco," he hisses, a menacing noise, "We are disappointed in you, Draco. Obviously not as, _cunning_, as we previously thought, wouldn't you agree, Bellatrix?"

My aunt, Bellatrix Lestrange appeared from behind another tooth, her crazy black hair more threatening then last time I had seen her.

"Draco, such a disappointment, Cissy and Lucius will be horrified. A coward for a son, a coward who let his friend die! What shall we do, Master?"

A smile played on the edges of Voldemort's mouth where the skin began, for, he had no lips.

"AVADA KEDAVRA!" he shouted, and a strong green light hit me hard in the chest.

I woke up screaming. The sweat ran cold down my back, and I was shivering, I was afraid that the Dark Lord wasn't truly dead. I gently touched the scar on my forearm; it was the same skull as in my dream. It used to be black, when the Dark Lord was alive, but now it is just a scar, with new pink skin grown over it. I hoped I hadn't woken up the other residents. The landlady and the other occupants surely had gotten used to my screams, I had lived here for three months, and every night I woke up the same way- sweating, screaming, terrified.

After the Battle of Hogwarts, my mother had, tried to wrap me in cotton wool and swaddle me like a child. It was infuriating, embarrassing, but when my mother had whispered into Harry Potter's ear whether I was dead or alive, all her love for my father and respect for my aunt evaporated on the spot. She only cared for me, her only son who had been dragged in Voldemort's games due to my father's failure. At the soonest chance, she had walked me away from that crumbling castle, full of death and misery, to home, Malfoy Manor. She hadn't anticipated that my childhood home was in fact now a home full of nightmares. It was the home where I heard Granger's screams of torture, where my wand was taken by Potter, and the place where, since I was a small child I had been bullied incessantly by my father.

All my school years, I had looked up to my father, a great man when I was good, but he always scorned me whenever I got less than _that muggle-born Granger _or Potter beat me in Defence against the Dark arts. Thing is, I bullied those kids, Colin Creevey, the Weasleys, Granger, Potter, the first years - because I thought he'd be proud, I wanted to make him happy. Even when I had become Seeker in my second year, it was my mother who wrote the letter congratulating me on my Quidditch skills, it was my mother who chose the sweets that came with all my parcels, you see, my father never sent one. Maybe he'd heard the rumours that the Gryffindors were spreading, that I had bribed the Quidditch team to let me play. That, in the end wasn't entirely true.

Years later, at the Ministry when the Dark Lord was truly back, and my father, caught red handed at the scene was sent to Azkaban, I couldn't help feeling betrayed. My father wasn't meant to get caught in the Ministry, Fudge _trusted _him, and he'd been stupid enough to get caught. So when the Dark Lord asked me if I would become a Death Eater, I thought he thought I was finally ready, to become a trusted member of Voldemort's inner circle, and to prove to him that Lucius Malfoy's son was a better Death Eater than him. Instead, I realised, as Professor Snape killed Dumbledore, that Voldemort _wanted _me to fail; he wanted a pawn in his midst, someone to do his bidding. For the past year of being a Death Eater, I was like Professor Snape in the end. I was just pretending to be a Death Eater, looking Voldemort in the eye, a swearing to do anything, but not really meaning it. However, I was never one for amateur dramatics. I was, and still am a coward. When I was little, my father would beat and scream at me for being one, but in fact he was a coward himself. It showed, especially in his trial, he was screaming, praying at the judges not to send him to Azkaban. He even tried his favourite lie; that he was under the Imperius curse the whole time. The Ministry wasn't having it. He was in Azkaban within the hour.

(He really shouldn't have been afraid; Voldemort blasted him out of Azkaban a year and a half later).

My Aunt, on the other hand, adored me, much like my mother. However, she was particularly enthusiastic about her Unforgivable Curses, and while I could cause as much pain as I liked with a word, a punch or a hex, I could never stomach the thought of _casting _an unforgivable curse. Sure, while I was a Death Eater and during the Battle of Hogwarts, I may have cast a Cruciatus curse or an Imperius curse, but I have never killed anyone with the Killing curse. Or that I can remember. Those days were a blur that I want to forget.

However, I can't banish the feeling of self-loathing, as today, even as I walk down Diagon Alley, people notice my trademark platinum blonde hair and began whispering behind my back. '_He was a Death Eater that one, worked for You-Know-Who'._ People still refer Voldemort as He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named or You-Know-Who, or in my particular case, the Dark Lord. Mostly, it's down to habit, or in some people's case, paranoia.

_Today's important_, I thought, finally getting out of bed, reaching for my jeans. _Muggle clothes,_ I thought, even though I had worn jeans for years. Old habits, especially old prejudices, die hard. I pulled on my jeans; found a t-shirt bundled up at the end of my bed. I rummaged on my floor until I found an emerald-green robe; the only robe aside a black one that I had actually bothered to take with me to the dingy flat. The colour was a painful reminder of my schooldays.

McGonagle had personally asked if I wanted to carry on doing my NEWTs, and I had declined saying, _maybe later._ Throughout my childhood, fuelled by my father's hate for Dumbledore, as early as eleven I started moaning how pathetic that Hogwarts was, with a stupid headmaster and incompetent teachers. I complained to my parents that why couldn't I be homeschooled? My father often agreed with me, even if he worked at the Ministry, he was sure he'd get an excellent teacher for me, from France or Russia perhaps. My mother, however, was adamant I would stay at Hogwarts. My parents would argue fiercely, but my mother would always win, she would gobble up my father's arguments like fire burns coal. So I stayed. I detested the lessons, apart from Potions, the teachers, especially my fourth year Defence against the Dark Arts teacher, who turned me into an ermine. I suppose, I can only admit to it now, is that I liked the company. I am not a creature of solitude, but when after 3 months of no friends and only your mother talking to you, I got used to it. I thought all the people I knew were stupid and arrogant, while I was clever, cunning and not at all cowardly. But when Crabbe died, I had barely seen much of him in a year; it was like my heart had been punched. I didn't think much of him, he was a brute and idiotic, but he and Goyle had followed me around for almost six years, and people who do that are hard not to like, or trust. Even Pansy Parkinson, who stuck to me like a sticking hex, I missed, she was annoying and clingy but she had been my girlfriend for two years.

_Enough with the memories,_ I told myself. My mother was coming to see me today, and although I had persuaded her against it, she was paranoid that Voldemort was going to kill me in my dreams. She'd wanted to come to see the flat, but I'd persuaded her against it, the flat was messy and unkempt, and small and dingy, with a host of rowdy neighbours, and it was all too likely that my mother would drag me into the fireplace and force-Floo powder me to Malfoy Manor.

I reached for my trainers by the door. Years ago, I'd been snobbish, and persuaded my father and mother for dragon skin boots, and then I'd wear them around school flaunting around my wealth. Now, I am still a coward, though I try to be less snobbish. I still mock others; I have the ability to make men yell at me, girls cry at me. If I wanted to, I could cause pain via a curse, a kick or a forced duel. My heart is like ice, and I have no respect. I am arrogant, I hate people, and those who hang around with me don't particularly want to. Perfection is impossible, and most people strive to be good people. But I can't even accomplish that.

I walked out into the hallway, down the rickety steps, remembering to jump over the disappearing step in-between apartments 15 and 14. I stopped outside Number 13, which had a strange lilac fog pouring out of the keyhole. Inside, I could hear a cacophony of swearing. The door burst open, revealing a girl with blackened hair sticking up all over the place, and a cauldron in her arms, which contained a bubbling vile looking liquid.

"Goddamit! I'm going to kill him! 'Wolfsbane will make any potion better.' What a _joke!_ Turned a simple wart potion into a murderous soup!" She bumped into me, sloshing some of the murderous soup on my jeans. The girl had dark hazel eyes, and pale creamy skin, and a wart on the edge of her chin. She didn't seem to care, and walked straight past me, cauldron in hand, and marched towards apartment 17.

"Alohomora," she whispered, and the door unlocked and swung open.

She pointed her wand, a long, feminine polished one, at the cauldron,

"Everte Statum," she said, and the cauldron whizzed into apartment 17.

"If you're interested," she huffed, "My name's Astoria. I'm your new neighbour."

She walked back into her room. I half considered calling her a Mud-blood bitch, even though I was clueless on her blood heritage. I decided against it, I wanted my school years behind me, and so, like a dog with its tail behind its legs I walked back to my room.


End file.
